thirty kisses
by panda-hiiro
Summary: thirty different themes on one relationship, and a kiss for each. izumixmeroko.
1. the space between dream and reality

author's note:

this is a project i'm working on for the livejournal community 30kisses. the idea is to write a short fiction for each of thirty specified themes, and each has to somehow involve a kiss (the themes can be found at the lj community). izumixmeroko is my OTP, so of course i chose to write for them. the 'kisses' will be in no specific order (this one is #06 according to the themes list), all will feature our favorite puppy and bunny shinigami, and likely won't be part of any continuing storyline. enjoy!

(disclaimer:

full moon wo sagashite and all related characters belong to arina tanemura, and not me (read: don't sue me).)

* * *

(theme 06 - 'the space between dream and reality')

* * *

-the space between-

The space between dream and reality lingers somewhere nearby, an empty void he has been trying to cross most of the night. He slips and slides, fumbles towards half-imagined figures of light and sound, grabbing blindly with tiny fingers. He wonders when his hands became so small, if they were always that way: stubby fingertips, dirt crusted under untrimmed fingernails, and reaching out for something, someone; anything, anyone.

He sees himself now, or some near-forgotten version like him because what he sees is a shivering huddle of a child, a six-year-old shock of blond hair and yellow eyes. His mother rages in the next room, the crashing and breaking and the frustrated wails of her midnight breakdown are little diluted by the paper-thin walls. His child-form covers his ears, squints closed his eyes and prays, begs, pleads for the noise to go away, for all the screaming and crying and hurting to stop.

And then it is quiet.

Izumi is vaguely aware of his surroundings now; the tousled sheets and upset of his bed, the dark claustrophobia of his tiny room, the cold beads of sweat on his forehead. His throat is dry and he speaks in a rasped whisper when he calls her name. She doesn't answer, and he doesn't know why. He tries again. The silence is oppressive in response; the absence of her voice echoes against the walls and fills the room. He cannot remember why she does not answer, or why her pillow next to him is untouched; he cannot remember the last time he held her, cannot remember the last time she whispered his name while he ran his hands through her hair; cannot remember the last time he kissed her and tasted her sweet strawberry mouth, cannot remember the last time she said she loved him. It dawns on him then that he lost her a long time ago, and he knows, knows that he lost her to some place he can never follow. He thinks on this until the pain of reality mingles with that of memory and at last he retreats into sleep, hoping to find her hidden somewhere between the nightmares.


	2. superstar

author's note:

the next of the 30 kisses themes. again, these are in no particular order and are not of any connected storyline.  
this one is obviously AU, but i think it will make sense.

many thanks to those who reviewed the first chapter! i hope you enjoy this next installment. and as always, i appreciate all comments and critique.

* * *

(theme 07 - 'superstar') 

* * *

-superstar- 

She's in love with a superstar.

She's a good fan, buys all the CDs and videos, papers her walls with posters and goes to all the concerts she can. She owns books and keychains with his name on them, an album full of photographs, and even one highly-coveted slip of autographed paper. She has all his songs memorized, sings them every time her friends invite her out for karaoke, hums them to herself when her mind wanders. She carries a photo of him in her wallet. She kisses that picture sometimes, when she thinks no one is looking.

"He's a waste of time, Me-chan," Izumi says to her one day.

He tolerates her blind worship of a pretty-boy rock icon, listens patiently when she prattles on about a new CDs and magazines, public appearances and photo shoots. He handles it well, all things considered.

"Takuto is _not_ a waste of time." She scrunches her face up and sticks her tongue out at him. "You're just jealous."

"He doesn't even know you exist."

"He does too! I've confessed my love for him fifty-three times already, in person, and i've sent him letters and-"

"Me-chan," he interrupts her. "He doesn't love you."

She is quiet.

"Neither do you, Izumi."

She turns away from him, and says nothing more before she walks away. He doesn't try to follow her.


	3. perfect blue

author's note:

many, many thanks to those that have given reviews on this so far. i really appreciate it. 3

randomly, in my mind this is set somewhere between the anime and manga universes. not that it's really important, given how short this drabble is, but...anyway. enjoy, and hopefully i won't be so long updating with the next theme.

* * *

(theme 15 - 'perfect blue')

* * *

Izumi hates sunny days.

He prefers the rain, likes to stand out in the downpour and let the the heavy drops kiss cold on his skin. He likes the clouds to hang low and oppressive above him, grey-saturated with approaching storms. He likes rainy days.

Rain is familiar.

It reminds him that he's alone.

He really hates sunny days, hates to look up at the endless, perfect blue of a summer afternoon. Sometimes the rain follows him, leaking out from deceptive tufts of white cloud, and these days are the worst; because it is all to easy to imagine the rain into her tears, and the memory of her twists the solitude into something unbearable.


	4. if only

author's note:

many, many thanks to those that have given reviews on this so far. i really appreciate it. 3

randomly, in my mind this is set somewhere between the anime and manga universes. not that it's really important, given how short this drabble is, but...anyway. enjoy, and hopefully i won't be so long updating with the next theme.

* * *

(theme 26 - 'if only i could make you mine...')

* * *

"If only I could make you mine..."

It was raining when she said it. She called out to him, but her words got lost, drowned somewhere in the cold, grey downpour. He didn't turn around to see the water melt into tears on her cheeks.

_"If only I could make you mine..."_

The words hadn't meant much to him, at the time.

Then, things changed.

She moved on.

It didn't take her long to find someone else, someone new to ignore her. She loved him, Izumi could tell. She loved him, and Izumi could tell by the way her face lit, the too eager enthusiasm in her voice; she loved him, but he didn't love her and Izumi could tell because _he_ never noticed the motion of her fingers gracing her lips, paused in anticipation of kisses never to come.

It hurt her. Izumi could tell.

And so he caught her one day, grabbed her thin arm and pulled her close to whisper,

"If only I could make you mine..."

The heartbreak in her eyes stopped him from finishing that sentence.


	5. candy

author's note:

again, thanks for the reviews. it really helps to know that someone's enjoying reading these.

i apologise for such a short chapter after such a long absence; i'm working on the next theme already, so hopefully it won't be so long before it's up! please enjoy, and as always, comments and criticism are always welcome.

* * *

(theme 23 - 'candy')

* * *

She wondered what it would be like to kiss him.

She imagined their lips first meeting with a great deal of passion: mouths parting, tongues sliding, and breath gasping. She wondered what it would taste like: all sugar-sweet candy flavored, or else something bitter, honey-dark and licorice-sour. She practiced what she might say afterwards, "I love you" and "I'll never leave you" and "You're my one-and only for ever and ever-after." Sometimes she went so far as to fill in his reply, but the words she thought for him never sounded quite genuine.

Much later, she looks back on their first kiss and wonders why it didn't live up to all her daydreams.


	6. red

author's note: first off, THANK YOU for the reviews! i really, really appreciate all of the feedback. i'm also very sorry that i took so long to update with this theme...i...honestly, just forgot. i hope that it won't happen again. xx please enjoy, and again, i appreciate any form of comments or criticism.

also, this is set in the animeverse, but the only real difference here is the color of meroko's outfit.

* * *

(theme 19 - 'red')

* * *

Red is not her favorite color. 

Izumi does not so much say that it looks good on her, not really, but he says that it's a fitting color, and that's as close as Meroko can expect to get from him. She wears red because she thinks it will make him notice her more. He doesn't.

White is her favorite color, but Izumi says that it isn't really a color, so it doesn't count. She likes it anyway. It reminds her of clean things, of purity and innocence. Sometimes she thinks that if she could wrap herself in white then she could be all of those things again, but Meroko never was very good at lying.

It's a cold, grey day when Izumi tells her he never wants to see her again. The sky is overcast, and the rain is just starting to fall when he turns his back on her for the last time. She watches him walk away, staring at the yellow-and-black afterimage he left behind, while the rain and tears shower kisses on red taffeta and white lace.


	7. good mood

author's note:

Oh, my God. I'm so behind. I'm sorry. I haven't forgotten about these stories, I swear! I really, really appreciate every review I've gotten. I'm so glad people are enjoying these. 

This one's a little different: there's fluff instead of angst! Now that's a change, for me.  
Also, this is mostly set in anime-verse, for the record.

* * *

(theme 12 - 'in a good mood')

* * *

He was waiting for her when she got home.

The fact that Izumi was in such a good mood worried her more than anything; there were only so many reasons he would be wearing that particular smirk, and all of them meant trouble.

"Welcome back, Me-chan," he said, as though it were perfectly normal for him to be lounging in the Kouyama living room. Jonathan hovered behind him, echoing Izumi's greeting.

"Welcome back, Me-chaaaaaan."

"I-I-Izumi-kun!" Meroko could hear her own too shrill voice and forced a nervous little smile. "What are you doing here?"

Izumi's smirk widened as he asked, tone dripping saccharine, "I wanted to see you. Do I need a reason for that?"

"Yes. I mean, no! No! Of course not! It's just, you know, I wasn't expecting to see you. Here. Now."

"Oh." He looked up at her and asked, all too innocently, "Did you want me to leave?"

"You don't _have_ to...I mean, I never said that..."

"Well," he said, settling back into his chair, "Maybe I'll just wait until Ta-kun and Mi-ki come home. I don't suppose you know where they are, do you?"

He gave her a _look_ then, and she'd swear he was able to read her mind by doing it.

"W-Well, that is, they're, I mean-"

"Oh, I see," Izumi interrupted, standing up. He crossed the room over to her, and the smirk he was wearing somehow managed to widen even more. "What you mean to say is, they'll be gone for a while."

"Y-yes. That's it. Not that they're doing anything suspicious. They're just out. Doing stuff." She waved her hands. "Normal shinigami-watching-a-twelve-year-old things."

"Of course they are." Izumi's hand was on her waist now. She wasn't sure when it had gotten there. "Which leaves you and me..."

"...and me," Jonathan interrupted. Izumi swatted at him, and the ghost flew across the room.

"So you're not going to go looking for them, or anything?" Meroko looked down at the hand on her waist, and...wait, he hadn't been that close a second ago...

"I suppose it can wait. Besides, I'd hate to interrupt the concert."

"The wha-!"

Izumi cut her off by pressing his lips to hers; as she leaned in to his kiss, her arms somehow finding their way to his chest, she couldn't help thinking just how troublesome Izumi's good moods could be.


	8. look

author's note:

I have no excuse. I fail at fanfic!

Anyway, please enjoy this latest chapter in all it's angst. Thanks to everyone that left reviews! I'll try to update again soon.

* * *

(theme 01 - 'look over here')

* * *

Sometimes Meroko wonders if there is such a thing as a ghost among the dead. She thinks that, if there is such a thing, then surely, that is what she has become. It must be, because there is no other explanation for how thoroughly and completely Izumi ignores her.

It isn't too much to ask for him to just spare one glance, she thinks. Just once. That's all she asks for. She runs the thought through her mind, over and over:

_Look over here, look over here, look over here, just please-please-please look over here..._

There are times Meroko believes that if she just keeps repeating it to herself, that eventually the thought will take solid form; that it would turn into a flashing sign, or a hand to slap Izumi behind his thick head. She changes things: a new dress, a new hairstyle. She holds non-conversations with him, talking for hours to his back; she tries crying, screaming his name at the top of her lungs, and always he turns away without a sound.

Eventually she gets tired of waiting, and she marches up to him, turns his head and kisses him right on the mouth. When she leans back, knowing for sure that this is it, this is her moment, he is looking at her, looking _right at her_, he stares at her and right on through, and Meroko feels more transparent than glass.


	9. cassette

author's note: and, just when you thought this fic would never see the light of day again...

many thanks to all that have read and reviewed; i'm glad that people are enjoying this story. : ) i'm going to make it my goal to have this challenge done by the end of the year, so look forward to a more regular update schedule soon!

* * *

(theme 14; radio cassette player)

* * *

- cassette -

An old, faded song plays through the speakers of Mitsuki's pink-plastic radio cassette player: a boy's voice, cracked with static and the age of the tape, the music behind him soft and slow. No wonder Route L was so popular, Meroko thinks, because despite the poor quality of the tape, there's something about the rough, unpolished edge of the sound that makes it feel all that more real, drawing her in, capturing and enthralling.

Izumi stands in the doorway watching her, but she doesn't hear him, too caught up in the music to notice his presence just yet. She sings along, voice quiet and out-of-tune, humming in places where she can't remember the words. He watches her for what seems like a long time, listening to her more than the actual song: the way she hums over the parts she doesn't know the words to, or how she gets just a little louder when the chorus kicks in, and that her voice doesn't match with this recorded version of Takuto's at all, but it still manages to work somehow.

Meroko's just gotten through a lyric about certain someones and missed kisses when Izumi coughs to get her attention. She jumps, startled, and fumbles for the 'stop' button on the cassette player; the music cuts off abruptly and she stares back at him.

"I-Izumi-kun...how long have you been standing there?"

"Oh, I came in somewhere around 'I'm falling in love with you,' or something like that."

"Oh, um. Well, what...what did you think?"

He smiles.

"You can't sing."

She stares at him for a moment, mouth gaping, before sticking her tongue out and turning the tape back on. She twists the little star-shaped volume knob up as high as it will go while that smile grows on his face, and just to spite him she sings even louder this time.


	10. ten

author's note: ahh, so much for that regular update schedule. things are a little hectic for me, but i will update as i can. i'm really glad to see that people are enjoying these stories. :) i appreciate all the reviews!

* * *

(theme 10; ten)

* * *

Ten candles, lit with ten tiny flicker-flames, all burning bright on a white-and-blue iced cake; it was his birthday, and his parents clapped and sang for him, and when he blew out the candles his mother leaned down and gave him a kiss on his cheek.

In the shadows of the room Izumi and Meroko stood as silent, unseen ghosts; Meroko wrung her hands, wrinkling the black silk-satin of her gloves.

"Do we really have to do this?"

The lingering smell of burnt wax and candle-smoke filled the room, and Izumi said nothing.


End file.
